Posted on 02/22/2005 7:08:24 PM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - With dropout rates rising, governors nationwide are being asked to lead a high school overhaul that demands more skills of students and help from colleges.
The call for action, outlined Tuesday by leaders of an upcoming national summit on high schools, would change everything from core course requirements to state graduation standards.
It came as the Educational Testing Service reported Tuesday that high school completion rates dropped nationally from 1990 to 2000, with about one third of students failing to graduate. It is the latest in a string of sobering assessments of high school performance.
"Students can make it to the top of the K-12 ladder, only to find that they still can't reach the bottom rung of success for the rest of their lives," said Ohio Gov. Bob Taft, co-chairman of Achieve, a group formed by governors to help states raise academic standards.
"In order to close this gap," Taft said at a news conference Tuesday, "we must pursue a fundamental redesign of a sacred institution — the American high school."
Governors from virtually all 50 states and five U.S. territories are expected to be in Washington on Saturday and Sunday for a summit hosted by Achieve and the National Governors Association. It is the fifth governors' education summit, but the first one on high schools.
"We have this moment in time, where there is a growing understanding that high school redesign and high school reform must be a national agenda item," said Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, chairman of the governors association and a leader of this weekend's meeting.
Summit leaders released their goals in advance of the event in hopes of building attention and momentum. Given the scope of the policy changes they want, and the fact that each state decides what to demand of students, organizers know they have a sales job to do.
It will start with the governors themselves — state chiefs who can help coordinate the efforts and missions of their states' overlapping education agencies. The goal is to unite governors, business executives and school leaders around a plan in each state to:
_ Demand tougher courses, and align graduation requirements with what's expected in college and the workplace. As one example, each state would need to require four years of rigorous English and math classes.
_ Redesign high school to provide all students with more choices and support. States would give priority to low-performing schools and provide more college-level courses.
_ Give all students excellent teachers and principals, particularly by offering incentives to draw top instructors toward the neediest schools.
_ Set clear, measurable goals for high schools and colleges, and vastly improve data collection and coordination between secondary schools and higher education.
_ Streamline education leadership. In most states, K-12 schools and postsecondary schools have separate governing boards and budgets, often contributing to competition over money.
Governors have become increasingly vocal about education reform, challenged to respond to unprecedented federal demands and complaints from employers. Arthur Ryan, chairman and CEO of Prudential Financial, said business leaders aren't happy with the pace of change.
"Improving one high school at a time or one state at a time simply isn't fast enough," said Ryan, co-chairman of Achieve.
The high school graduation rate, meanwhile, remains the subject of debate. The new report by the nonprofit Educational Testing Service shows that the high school completion rate was 70 percent in 2000, down from 72 percent in 1990. It dropped in all but seven states.
"This is a story of losing ground," said Paul Barton, the ETS researcher who wrote the report. "At the same time that the dropout rate is increasing and out-of-school education and training opportunities are dwindling, the economic status of young dropouts has been in a free fall since the late 1970s."
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On the Net:
National Education Summit on High Schools: http://www.2005summit.org
Education Testing Service: http://www.ets.org
The state of education is pretty sorry. Better hurry up and get yourselves a private retirement account, because it's a sure bet there won't be enough educated youngins to support us boomers in retirement.
They need to haul 'em over to the nearest cliff and heave 'em on over.
Leave No Taxpayers Wallet Behind
Has anybody thought that getting rid of the Department of Education, and returning schools to local school boards, would be a giant step forward to improving American education?
In that case, what good would a private retirement account be? You might have capital, but without skilled workers there will be no business to invest it in.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Get real. And take away the feds one and only indoctrination stations? Won't happen, never. It would be the best thing to happen to education since Brown Vs. Kansas Board of Education. The thought of those billions of dollars flowing through pols hands into the DoE and on to the NEA stopping would cause a total gastric bypass in the beltway. The lock grip the feds have on education would take the jaws of life to pry from their greedy little mits. I am with you on this, just don't see it happening in my great great gradchildrens' lifetime.
My point is that SS will collapse or become a welfare program. It's not something I intend to depend on.
You could invest in Soilent Green, hehe.
One third of HS kids are dropping out...which probably means they can't handle the course work as it exists, and the solution is to:
Demand tougher courses, and align graduation requirements with what's expected in college and the workplace. As one example, each state would need to require four years of rigorous English and math classes.
Seems to me they need to start way before HS to accomplish their goals.
I'm all for tougher courses, but you can't just start them in HS and expect the kids to do well.
More power to ya' umgud. Less dependency on the gubment mule means more freedom to do what you want. Like move to a nice sunny southern location when the poop hits the piper.
They don't even start basic math until the third grade in most schools, and they expect them to be doing Trig by their senior year? Bwahaha!!
I haven't been to a school in ages, but they used to have vocational and industrial arts classes which allowed stidents to be exposed to all sorts of potential future work endeavors.
Now , many districts and school boards feeel it is better to teach kids how to put condoms on cucumbers and bananas and dress up and be Islamic for a week.
Have schools lost their focus?
Corrupt institutions are incapble of reforming themselves. -Nelson Mandela.
Until they give up the Utopian BS that presumes EVERY kid will meet all their goals, they'll never get anywhere. 1/3 may be too high, but a good 10-15% even in a good school like the one I'm observing in (let alone inner cities and whatnot) simply check-out. They refuse to be part of the process and no threat motivates them. Beyond that, there's a certain amount who just can't handle it.
And yet every "new" thing that comes down the pike insists "every child will succeed." Balderdash.
We might get somewhere if we revived the concept of apprenticeships and taught the ones who refused to participate in academic education a trade that would enable them to at least be self-supporting citizens. Vocational education as a sideline to futile efforts to force academics misses the point.
That was a major point in Ronald Reagan's first campaign, if he couldn't get it done, I sure can't.
He also said a country that can't control it's borders is not a country. he couldn't fix that either.
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